Grumbling about the lack of service one recieves outside of Asia

In Australia, first of all you have to fill the gas in your car yourself.tonight i get out put the bowser pump into the car and wait for it to be turned on, after a minute or so an attendent comes out and says i'll have to wait a minute becuase he's changing the price, up 10 cents, hang on I was already here, nope sorry you have to pay new price.OK, i left and refused. next station, attendent waves me to come inside, how much gas do you want? I dunno, its not my car, but you have to prepay, can i leave my credit card, nope, tell me an amount, but if i'm wrong do i get a refund? nope.needless to say I drove off away from that dickhead too! gimmi thai and indo gas stations anyday!

Hanging Rock New Years Racing Day!

Well, not exactly Asia, but Australia. Visited Hanging Rock for the new years day races. A picnic, in beltingly warm weather (over 40 degrees).

But still good fun, we won on two of the horses, (a good Aussie tradition) and afterwards wander around the rock as well.

I'd explained the story of "picnic at hanging rock" already to K, so she was a little nervous.... ;)

The climb to the summit was hot and exhausting, but the views from the top were worth it!

Internet frustrations

get a call from the internet mob today.

caller:"blah blah blah, you have bill for 417,000 rupiah ?"

me"yes, i know, it's a promotional price for unlimited usage, so it's always that price."

caller"for december bill?"

me"yes i know, it's an automatic debit from my bank account"

caller"yes, but its 417,000rupiah"

me"yes i know but the bill is not due until the 20th, and its a set amount, same every other month, and its automatic debit."


Hmmm, so what was that all about? A sudden out-of-the-blue reminder to make sure I pay my bill? Which I've been doing every month for the last year and a half on the same set price? And actually they collect my bill each and every month anyway....

MRT - Mass Rapid Transportation system, Jakarta Style! :(

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Most Asian countries these days have some sort of Mass Rapid Transportation system, Hong Kong the very efficient subway, Shanghai - the excellent monorail, Bangkok - the MRT subway and the BTS overhead railway...

Jakarta has long had a traffic problem, so the Indonesian solution.......

Busway!

What is a busway i hear you ask?? Well subways and monorails etc are too expensive for Indonesia so we get the busway.

Yes, yes, yes, but what is it?

Well, you cut a major arterial road in half, place some bluestone blocks in the way to keep cars out of it, and then run ordinary 'special' buses along this 'dedicated busway lane'. Mind you at crossroads and the start and end of each busway the said busses still have to fight with the traffic, oh yes and funding to actually provided buses to travel these routes is somewhat limited. But never mind, Sutiyuso, previous major/governer of jakarta allegedly made US$ 8,000,000 in bribes and kickbacks per busway line he signed off on, hence the possible reason he signed off on as many as possible before his term of office expired.

And what do you think the result of cutting roads in half is.....? Yep, worse traffic. :(

Here's some pics of the magnificent busway being built......

I didnt mean to capture a pic of the worker sleeping, but its perhaps rather appropriate of the Indonesian work ethic....

and almost complete busway in Pondok Indah area.... nice innit?

oh sorry didnt realise, the raised concrete thingy next to my (stationary car) is the busway lane!

actually, those pics were taken in Pondok Indah, which is an area of a lot of new money, palatial OTT mansions etc, locals call them Rumah Pembantu, which translates as the maids house, cos most of these people are never there anyway, just the house staff.

Anyway - these people protested the most out of everyone against the busway being built in their area, so last week some important person sat down and negotiated with them, end result, cars can use the busway line in Pondok Indah during peak hours......

Leaving the rest of us confused as to the point in spending all of that money to put in this lane in the first place....

Jakarta Bintags vs Malaysia Warriors, what a wet day!

We hosted the Malaysian team to come over and play some footy (AFL). There was a game before between 2 under 18's teams; the British International School team and the Depok (locals) team. The sun was belting down, and most of the blokes were busy applying sunscreen, by the time we started our warm up it was beginning to rain a little.

In the third quarter we actually had to cease play for about 10 minutes due to some close hitting lightening, by the end of the game the field was flooding!



And about 40 minutes later the sun come out!